St. Cloud janitors eligible for settlement money

ST. PAUL — Janitors who worked at two St. Cloud clothing retailers are eligible to join a $425,000 lawsuit settlement.

Last year, eight employees of Capital Building Services Group in the Twin Cities sued the company, alleging improper pay practices. The plaintiffs and Capital settled earlier this spring.

Capital is a subcontracted cleaning company based in Illinois that employs people who work in a variety of retail stores.

An attorney for the janitorial workers, Adam Hansen, said anyone who worked for Capital at the Herberger's or Macy's stores in St. Cloud from May 2012 to January 2016 is a member of the class that settled in the lawsuit. This makes them eligible for part of the settlement money, but they need to contact him before Thursday.

A formula that factors in how long people worked for Capital and other data will determine the size of payments, Hansen said.

U.S. District Court certified the class-action lawsuit, the attorney said. It found Capital's policies over which eight people sued were similar if not the same as ones that affected people outside the metro area, according to Hansen.

He said one plaintiff was essentially a regional supervisor for Capital for nine months. In court, that person provided evidence of widespread wrongdoings, Hansen said. Those improprieties included people not receiving at least minimum wage, not having recorded hours reflect time worked and not receiving overtime pay.

"We don't have any evidence of it happening directly at the Herberger's in St. Cloud," said Stephanie Gasca. She is a representative of Centro de Trabajadores Unidos en la Lucha, or CTUL. The group name translates to Center of Workers United in Struggle, Gasca said, and it helped organize laborers in the Twin Cities for the lawsuit.

Gasca said the CTUL office regularly hears complaints about what she called "wage theft," especially in the cleaning industry.

She said some workers in the Capital lawsuit were not receiving pay stubs. Some were receiving real wages of $4-5 per hour, Gasca said, and some did not have the option of being paid with a paycheck.

Hansen said class members need to contact him at ahansen@nka.com or 612-256-3207.

Attorneys for Capital were not available to comment on the settlement Friday.

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